


all of these disasters and you're still by my side

by orphan_account



Category: StarKid Productions RPF, The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals - Team StarKid
Genre: Domestic, F/M, Fluff, How original, No Smut, Passover, a passover quarantine fic, pasech, they were roommates, they're sweet babies in love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:01:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23648881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: they're stuck together and passover's tomorrowor, paul crushing hard on emma for 1k words
Relationships: Paul Matthews/Emma Perkins
Comments: 2
Kudos: 26





	all of these disasters and you're still by my side

**Author's Note:**

> gah. another quarantine fic? another passover fic? who'da thunk? 
> 
> i thought this idea was sweet and was hoping to put it up at the beginning of passover, but that didn't happen, so enjoy this delayed, un-betaed, unedited, super rough fic! happy passover to everyone celebrating, and may the plague pass over us all. (that was corny uGH)

It’s been going on for, what, a month now?

Paul considers himself lucky— the day Hatchfield finally joined the rest of the country in quarantine from this god-knows-what virus (The General denied knowing anything, but Paul knew better), he’d been with Emma at the mall and they’d just finished stocking up on their groceries for the foreseeable future. 

Neither of them understood the sudden rush of frantic customers raiding the shelves like minds possessed, the shouting matches that turned to hellbent fistfights, and they especially didn’t understand the immediate depletion of toilet paper. Of all the things to go first. Toilet paper. People just made no sense these days.

“I mean, it could be worse, right?” Paul reasoned, arranging their groceries on the discount shelves Emma found on ebay for their almost decent apartment. “We just had people bursting into panicked screams. It could’ve been people bursting into song.” He shuddered. “God, like a musical. Can you imagine that Emma? A musical.”

Emma rolled her eyes, tossing him a can of tomato soup. “We get it, you hate musicals.”  
“It’s not JUST a musical, the idea of people just randomly singing and dancing sets me on--”  
His significantly shorter other threw her hands up in the air, exasperation written all over her usually expressionless face. “Nobody cares! It was Black Friday all over again, and you’re out here saying a real life Rent would’ve been hell. Weirdo.”  
“You love me.”  
“Yeah, don’t push your luck, asshole.”

Paul beamed at the unusual term of affection, letting it save in his mental list of happy times. Currently that included a Buzzfeed Unsolved watch party with Bill, Alice, and Deb, babysitting Hannah, Lex’s kid sister, and finding common ground with Tom over their taste in coffee, but Emma was always at the top of the list for him. He doubted she could be anywhere else in his mind, and he was definitely okay with that. 

The two quickly settled into a nicely workable schedule of taking walks, sitting on the couch working side by side, reading growing marijuana how-to books (that was Emma) or film reviews from the early 2000s (that was Paul) and overall getting out of each other’s hair. They poked fun at the people who were flailing on social media and traded sarcastic jabs at the government’s (lack of) involvement with this whole situation. All things considered it wasn’t such a bad setup. 

Right?

“Hey, Emma, you okay?” he asks, looking up from his many tabs on independent film to the apparently dead barista lying on the couch with all the fervour of one done with life.  
“ ‘m okay” came the weak reply.  
“Okay?”  
“Mmkay.”  
“Okay.”  
“ ‘kay.” 

Emma blinks her eyes, pushing herself from her slumped over position. She sits cross legged on the couch and leans her head to the side wearily.  
“Hey Paul?”  
“Yeah Emma?”  
“Passover starts tomorrow.”

This fact, in and of itself, doesn’t surprise Paul. That it was coming from Emma Perkins, self-professed agnostic and apathetic to anything even remotely religious or traditional, does.

He puts his laptop down. “And?”

Emma yanks on the collar of her shirt, grimacing as she shrugs. “And we were going to have a seder with Tom and Tim. The whole pesach crap and whatnot.” She lets the words fall morosely.  
Paul does his best to follow, but it comes up short. “So…”  
“So we can’t even do that because we’re stuck here, that’s what.”

Oh.

“Oh.”  
“Yeah, oh.” Emma lets a fist drag across her forehead. “I’ve been thinking about it for weeks.”  
“I- I’m sorry, Em.” 

Paul moves over to pat her back, and she ends up falling backwards into his lap, mourning. “I didn’t know you were Jewish.”  
“Not something I really talk about. Jane was always more into it than I was, y’know?” Emma looks up, shaking her head sadly. “But god, she’d always make me break challah and have Purim and Hanukkah and I went along with it because come on, it’s Jane, like, anything for my sister--- and now she’s fucking dead and my family’s literally 20 minutes away. 20 minutes, Paul. I can’t even be in the same house with them.” Emma closes her eyes and mutters curses under her breath. “Is this shitty or what?”

Paul doesn’t quite know what to say, so he merely nods. “Well… You have me.”  
He hastily explains himself before Emma can squint at him, cheeks going red. “I mean, yknow, that I’m here and I’d like to help you celebrate as much as you can… that is, if you want to. I’m not trying to-“  
“No, no, that’s actually not a bad idea,” Emma interrupts. She jumps up, tugging at her mangled hair, the ideas tumbling out from her suddenly energetic self. “There’s like this zoom seder from the synagogue at Clivesdale that’s up on Friday, maybe, uh, I don’t know, we could make matzo for that? Shit. What else did we have for this week? I gotta ask Tom.” Her face brightens considerably, and she punches Paul in the arm. “You’re a fucking godsend— what would I do without you?”  
“Start a very successful self-medication business independently and not hear about my distaste of musicals?”  
“Exactly that. Love you dude.” Emma slides off the couch, rummaging through their pantry for ingredients. Paul watches her, a small smile on his face.  
“You too.”

He doesn’t mention that he’d probably be living an entirely less fulfilling life, if the question were asked of him.  
Instead he opens a new tab and starts searching for “passover at home” ideas.

“Okay,” Paul says an hour later, pencil wedged behind an ear, notes all over the place, “so we can’t have anything that’s not kosher, which is like most breads and conventional foods— how is that gonna work?”  
“To be honest? I have no damn clue.” Emma scratches her head, glancing at the odds and ends scrounged up from the cabinets. “Jane thought of everything, I just did whatever she told me to when I was here. If I was here at all.”  
She says the last words bitterly, hand smacking the counter top. “Was this stupid? This was stupid. I’m stupid. God. Why am I even trying?”  
“Hey, hey, no,” Paul shakes his head, gently placing a hand on Emma’s arm. “She’d probably want you to do this. Even if she’s not here to do it with you.”  
Emma takes a breath, ragged and sharp. “I mean… okay.”  
“Like I said, I’m here for you.” Paul hands her a list of Passover foods, carefully giving her a hug. “It’s gonna be fun.”

Emma squeezes back. “Well duh, you’re stuck with me.” She pulls back, tilting her head skeptically. “Why are you doing this anyway? It’s just one week.”  
“It’s with you, why wouldn’t I?”  
“God, that’s disgusting, stop being so loyal.” She swats Paul away, but a glimpse of a smile is on her face, and Paul bites his lip to stop from grinning. 

Chag sameach then.

**Author's Note:**

> comment below if you'd like more chapters to this or specific stories written!
> 
> tumblr: https://tarre-on-fiction.tumblr.com/
> 
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End file.
